The Frog Prince
by strangertrack
Summary: The prince wants some company and only another prince will do. Bel/Mammon.


I have a thing for odd Bel/Mammon fics. In my mind, they're total BFFs. They exchange catty comments and enjoy one-upping each other, but they get each other like no one else.

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**The Frog Prince**

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Mammon found Bel sprawled on the library floor, setting up his knives around him like an impenetrable fortress.

"Bel, have you seen Phantasma?" Mammon asked despondently. "When I woke up this morning, he was gone."

"Shishishi. Maybe it ran away," Bel grinned, stabbing another knife into the plush carpet.

Mammon frowned and turned to continue his search.

"Or maybe it died when I threw it against the wall."

Mammon whirled around, baby voice shrill with indignation. "Why would you do that, Bel?"

Bel shrugged lazily. "I said maybe," he reminded.

"Did you?"

"Did I what?"

"Throw my frog against the wall," Mammon said, exasperated.

"Hm. Did I? I don't remember," Bel lied, smiling innocently.

"...mu."

Bel flicked his wrist and embedded another knife into the floor. "I thought it was the frog prince," he said dreamily after a pause. "So I let it drink from my cup and eat from my plate, held it against me in my bed. But it was just an ugly toad."

He pulled out the frog from inside his pocket and dangled it teasingly by one leg.

"Life isn't a fairy tale, Bel," Mammon grumbled as he took the bait and stepped carefully around the moat of knives. His tone suggested they've already held this exact same conversation several times before. "Besides, you're not a princess or a fair maiden. Why would you want to find a prince?"

Bel tilted his head sideways, looking endearingly lost. "Even a prince gets lonely at times. Only puppet subjects and no equals to talk to."

"...you can talk to Lussuria. He'll listen to you."

"That disgusting fag," Bel scowled. "He's beneath royalty's notice. Only another prince will do."

"Then why did you kill your own brother? You could have talked to him."

"He was a cockroach, not a prince." Bel's words were sharp, daring to cut Mammon if he dared disagree.

Mammon shrugged and took repossession of his frog, climbing onto Bel's lap to shorten the dropping distance from Bel's raised hand to his hood. He didn't sense the danger until it was too late.

Bel slammed him to the floor and pinned him quite literally, knife whispering past skin and bone as it pierced through cloth.

"What is it, Bel?"

"Maybe you're the one," he said thoughtfully, leaning down to study Mammon. "The real frog prince, cursed in illusion."

"...I'm not a prince. If anything, I'd be the dark wizard who cast the curse."

"Shishishi, true~ so true~"

Still, Bel did not let him go and instead slipped a hand under Mammon's mantle, fondling the hidden pacifier.

"!!!"

"To break the curse... it should be true love's first kiss. A kiss from a prince in shining armor!"

And Bel closed the gap and placed his mouth over Mammon's in a most _un_romantic kiss, lips twitching against Mammon's before he exploded into giggles.

"Shishishi, it didn't work!" he declared the obvious when the only transformation was a deepening of Mammon's usual frown.

"I should think not, Bel. Now let me up."

"Don't order me around, you infuriating brat," Bel grinned without malice as he poked Mammon's cheek. "I've still got the upper hand. I can kill you right now."

Mammon sighed heavily. "What do you want?"

"Turn into a prince, so that I may enjoy some company."

"Just for a little while," Mammon accepted the term without enthusiasm. He sat up once Bel had freed him and then cast his illusion. His limbs seemed to lengthen, his hoodie dropped back, a circlet of silver emerged in his hair, and when the change was complete, Bel was staring at his own mirror image.

"Not like that!" Bel flared with abrupt anger, shoving a blade under the doppelganger's throat. "I'll really kill you, guardian or not."

"I don't know what princes look like," Mammon said plaintively. "You're the only one I know."

"Use your imagination. That should be an illusionist's specialty."

Mammon sat there thinking for a moment, then nodded in decision. His blond hair turned ashen, shortening across the face and lengthening around to reveal and flatter regal features, and his eyes took on a shade of red like drying blood. The distinctive purple tattoos returned to decorate pale cheeks.

"Hm, the prince approves although he doesn't appreciate the fact that your crown is bigger."

Wordlessly, Mammon handed his crown over to Bel and took Bel's tiara in exchange.

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**The End.**

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December 20, 2008


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